Crime and Justice News

Company Paying $392K Fine For Pet Food Eaten by Federal Inmates

August 18, 2012 12:44:00 pm

Some federal prisoners unknowingly ate pet food due to problems with the resale of meat from an East Texas food company that specializes in fajita meat, reports the Dallas Morning News. John Soules Foods, Inc. of Tyler, Tx., has agreed to pay $392,000 to settle a case brought by the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It involved raw “beef trimmings” that were intended for pet food cans but ended up being eaten by humans. The government’s three-year investigation found that the problems occurred in late 2006 and early 2007.

John Soules Foods had problems “getting some of their beef trimmings product to freeze properly,” authorities said. As a result, the company sold boxes of those trimmings to a meat broker who agreed to sell it as pet food. The boxes were not marked as pet food. That broker violated the agreement and sold the trimmings to another broker for human food. Some of it ended up being sold to the Federal Bureau of Prisons for human consumption. “There is no evidence that anyone who consumed any of the ‘beef trimmings’ product suffered any ill effects,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office said. Under the agreement, the company will not be prosecuted but will have to adopt new food safety procedures